Roman Polanski's expulsion from the motion-picture academy that awarded him an Oscar 15 years ago was mishandled, says the lawyer who represents the fugitive in his sex-crime case in Los Angeles.

Lawyer Harland Braun said the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences' own rules should have allowed for Polanski to make his case against expulsion, and he was preparing to do so when the academy acted Tuesday night.

"We suspected something might be happening, and we were totally prepared, I've got all the documents, I could have presented them in less than an hour," Braun told USA TODAY in a phone interview from Boston.

"The rules provide that (targets) have an opportunity to present their side and I was looking forward to presenting (Polanski's) side," he said. "It reflects very poorly on the academy that they would just do this" before hearing from the 84-year-old filmmaker.

The academy's response is that the Board of Governors has the right to take action on any matter if it relates to a member’s status and standards of conduct, said Teni Melidonian, spokeswoman for the academy.

"Per the academy’s bylaws, Article 10, Section 3: Any member of the academy may be suspended or expelled for cause by the Board of Governors. Expulsion or suspension as herein provided for shall require the affirmative vote of not less than two-thirds of all the Governors."

The academy's original statement did not elaborate on why it waited until 2018 to act against Polanski when his criminal case dates to 1978.

Polanski received the best-director award for The Pianist in 2003, nearly three decades after pleading guilty to sex with a 13-year-old girl and then fleeing the country.

Melidonian confirmed to USA TODAY his Oscar would not be taken away.

Braun represents Polanski in his long-running, and so far unsuccessful, effort to get the Los Angeles District Attorney's office to drop its case to extradite Polanski from France, where he mostly lives, to Los Angeles to serve the few months remaining on his sentence in the 40-year-old statutory rape case, and pay a price for fleeing California justice for so many decades.

Braun said Polanski has been mistreated by the criminal justice system in California, and that multiple inquiries in Europe stemming from the extradition proceedings have confirmed that. He said he was preparing to tell that to the academy when it acted.

Samantha Geimer faces the media at Los Angeles Superior Court after a hearing on the Roman Polanski case on June 9, 2017.(Photo: Damian Dovarganes, AP)

The Polanski case dates from 1977 when Polanski had sex with Geimer, then 13, after giving her champagne and a sedative, which is statutory rape. He was arrested, spent time in jail, then pleaded guilty in a plea bargain. He fled the country in 1978 after becoming convinced the judge in the case, now deceased, planned to sentence him to a lengthy prison term in contravention of his plea agreement.

Ever since, he's been unable to return to the U.S., not even to collect his Oscar or to appear at the Academy Awards ceremonies when he was nominated for best director in 1981 for Tess. (He also was nominated for Chinatown in 1975, for Rosemary's Baby in 1969, and for a foreign language film, Knife in the Water, in 1964.)

In a rare interview, Polanski addressed his criminal case with The Hollywood Reporter while promoting his latest movie, Based on a True Story, in Zurich in October.

“As far as what I did: It's over. I pleaded guilty,” said Polanski. “I went to jail. I came back to the United States to do it, people forget about that, or don't even know. I then was locked up here (in Zurich for nearly a year during extradition proceedings). So in the sum, I did about four or five times more than what was promised to me” in his original plea agreement.

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The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the organization that bestows the Oscars, announced Thursday that it has voted to expel two prominent members convicted of sexual offenses, Bill Cosby and Roman Polanski, from its membership. In Polanski's case, the expulsion comes more than 40 years after he was accused of raping a 13-year-old girl and 15 years after he won a best director Oscar.
LAURENT EMMANUEL/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

Adrien Brody (left) and Roman Polanski on the set of 2002's "The Pianist." Polanski won best director and Brody won best actor for their work on the film. Polanski didn't attend the Oscar ceremony because he was a fugitive from U.S. justice after fleeing the country in 1978. Presenter Harrison Ford accepted the award on Polanski's behalf.
GUY FERRANDIS/FOCUS FEATURES

Roman Polanski, right, receives his best director Oscar from Harrison Ford at the 29th American Film Festival of Deauville, in Normandy, France, on Sept. 7, 2003. Ford gave Polanski the best director Oscar he won earlier that year for "The Pianist."
FRANCK PREVEL/ASSOCIATED PRESS

An activist is led away by security inside La Cinematheque Francaise in Paris on Oct. 30, 2017. Feminist groups staged a protest against a retrospective honoring director Roman Polanski at the film institute.
FRANCOIS MORI/AP

Roman Polanski remains a fugitive after pleading guilty to unlawful sex in 1977 with Samantha Geimer, a 13-year-old girl he plied with champagne and quaaludes during a photo shoot. Geimer, right, walks to face the media at Los Angeles Superior Court after a motion hearing on June 9, 2017. Geimer, who appealed to a judge to end the case against Polanski, has said she's forgiven Polanski for the assault that took place at Jack Nicholson's compound in Hollywood Hills. Nicholson wasn't home at the time.
DAMIAN DOVARGANES/AP

Roman Polanski and his wife, French actress and singer Emmanuelle Seigner, pose at Montreux Jazz Festival in Montreux, Switzerland, on July 17, 2010. Polanski made his first public appearance since being released from house arrest to see his wife perform at the fest.
LIONEL FLUSIN/MONTREAUX JAZZ FESTIVAL VIA AP

The body of actress Sharon Tate is taken from her rented house on Cielo Drive in Beverly Hills on Aug. 9, 1969. Tate, who was eight months pregnant, and four others were found murdered by cult leader Charles Manson and his followers. Tate was the wife of director Roman Polanski.
AP

Roman Polanski is shown leaving court on Sept. 19, 1977, in Santa Monica, Calif., after being ordered to undergo a 90-day diagnostic study at a state prison. After pleading guilty to unlawful sex with a minor in 1977, Polanski fled the United States the following year.
AP